I am senior fellow for environment policy at the Heartland Institute and managing editor of Environment & Climate News. I write about energy and environment issues, frequently focusing on global warming. I have presented environmental analysis on CNN, CNN Headline News, CBS Evening News, MSNBC, Fox News Channel, and several national radio programs. My environmental analysis has been published in virtually every major newspaper in the United States. I studied atmospheric science and majored in government at Dartmouth College. I obtained my Juris Doctorate from Syracuse University.

As 2011 comes to a close, climate science celebrates an important landmark. It has now been 33 years, or a third of a century, since sensors aboard NASA and NOAA satellites began measuring temperatures throughout the earth’s lower atmosphere.

For 33 years, we have had precise, objective temperature data that do not require guesswork corrections to compensate for uneven thermometer placement and non-climate surface temperature biases such as expanding urban heat islands and land-use changes. The satellite data, moreover, tell us the earth is warming at a more modest, gradual, and reassuring pace than was foretold by United Nations computer models.

The satellite sensors became operational at a time that is very convenient for those who believe humans are causing a global warming crisis. Global temperatures declined from the mid-1940s through the late 1970s. As a result, the sensors coincidentally began measuring global temperatures at the very beginning of our most recent global warming trend. Had the sensors been in place 33 years earlier, during the 1940s, the overall pace of warming shown by the satellite sensors would be less than half what is shown by the post-1978 temperature data.

Even so, the measured temperature trend is quite modest. John Christy, who along with Roy Spencer oversees the NASA satellite sensor program, reports temperatures have warmed at an average pace of 0.14 degrees Celsius per decade since the satellite sensors became operational. This is merely half the pace predicted by computer models utilized by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Christy appears to be making a generous concession regarding the warming that has occurred. The temperature data seem to show warming closer to 0.3 degrees over the 33 year period, or 0.09 degrees Celsius per decade. But why quibble over the difference? A warming of 0.14 degrees per decade, or 1.4 degrees per century, is still significantly less than predicted by UN climate models and far from an impending global warming crisis.

Importantly, the satellite sensors show less warming in the lower troposphere (approximately 10,000 feet above the earth’s surface) than is reported by surface temperature readings. Global warming theory holds that one of the fingerprints of human-induced global warming is more rapid warming in the lower troposphere than at the surface. The reason for this is carbon dioxide molecules reside in the lower troposphere and have their greatest heat-trapping effect there.

As a result, if global temperatures are rising as a result of human carbon dioxide emissions, the satellite sensors should report more warming in the lower troposphere than is actually occurring at the surface. In essence the satellite sensors should report a warming trend somewhat more severe than is actually occurring at the surface of the earth.

Surface temperature measurements, however, indicate more rapid warming at the surface of the earth than in the lower troposphere. According to James Hansen of NASA’s Goddard Institute, temperatures at the surface of the earth rose twice as fast during the past 33 years as the satellite data show. Surface temperatures compiled by the UK’s University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit reflect a similar warming trend.

With temperature data indicating more warming at the earth’s surface than in the earth’s lower troposphere, one of the following must be true: (1) the surface temperature data is more corrupted by heat biases such as expanding urban heat islands and localized land-use changes than the IPCC admits, (2) the warming of the past 33 years is primarily the result of factors other than greenhouse gas emissions, or (3) longstanding, widely believed assumptions about greenhouse gas theory are wrong.

Regardless of which one or more of the three options are true, the satellite sensors have contributed greatly to our scientific understanding of the earth’s ever-changing climate. Thirty-three years and counting, we rightly celebrate the scientific advances provided by satellite temperature sensors.

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The temperatures of the atmosphere have not risen because the energy trapped by the Earth was not stored in the atmosphere but rather in the oceans. In a very recent study described in the September issue of Nature Climate Change (1, 360–364, 2011). As the authors describe…

“There have been decades, such as 2000–2009, when the observed globally averaged surface-temperature time series shows little increase or even a slightly negative trend1 (a hiatus period). However, the observed energy imbalance at the top-of-atmosphere for this recent decade indicates that a net energy flux into the climate system of about 1 W m−2 (refs 2, 3) should be producing warming somewhere in the system4, 5. Here we analyse twenty-first-century climate-model simulations that maintain a consistent radiative imbalance at the top-of-atmosphere of about 1 W m−2 as observed for the past decade. Eight decades with a slightly negative global mean surface-temperature trend show that the ocean above 300 m takes up significantly less heat whereas the ocean below 300 m takes up significantly more, compared with non-hiatus decades. The model provides a plausible depiction of processes in the climate system causing the hiatus periods, and indicates that a hiatus period is a relatively common climate phenomenon and may be linked to La Niña-like conditions.” [1]

It is likely that this energy will not remain trapped beneath the surface of the oceans for long without manifesting itself.

And now that the warmists and their models and predictions are all proven wrong yet again we are to believe that the warmng is now ‘hiding’.

I have performed research and received daily news alerts on global warming for almost a decade now. I find it difficult to describe just how uplifting it is to see the skeptics vindicated and the mainstream media and politicians completely ignoring the global warming scam. The warmists are reduced to ranting on obscure blogs with only the occasional regurgitated article published by ‘real’ news outlets – almost always by the same handful of reporters who will never admit that they were wrong. I think AP, MSNBC, Huffpo and the NYT are the only places that will still publish global warming propaganda. It was wonderful to see everybody completely ignore the Durban UN/COP17 conference.

Thankfully for humanity, the jig is up and the gravy train of taxpayer grants will soon be grinding to a halt. I wonder how long it will be before scientists regain their credibility and people trust ‘science’ again. Will scientists ever reject the world of activism, politics and billions in grant money and go back to real science or is science as we knew it dead?

Ahhh…the ignorance and bitterness of the warmist cult makes me smile every time I see it on display!

Congratulations skeptics! Keep up the great work! Confront the warmists every time they post more of their debunked garbage. Even though the whole global warming scam is the punchline we all knew it would become do NOT delude yourself that they will just give up and walk away from the wealth and power they craved. This scam will take decades to be completely wiped out.

Is it really your opinion that climate scientists are wealthy and powerful? If so, I wonder how you’ve reached such an absurd conclusion.

If you take into account the years of higher education required for academic positions, climate scientists are paid relatively poorly. They would be far wealthier if they worked as medical doctors, lawyers or businessmen. On that basis alone, it’s illogical to accuse climate scientists of pursuit of wealth and power.

The type of conspiracy theory that you’re spinning reeks of desperation. You push speculation and ignore facts. More problematic is your willingness to spread falsehoods to support your agenda. It leads me to the conclusion that you doubt you can win the debate on merit.

Actually most of the corrupt climate scientists pushing the AGW scam are activists at heart and are just using the scam in an attempt to implement the social/environmental changes they think the world needs. They make a living off of the scam but you are correct in one sense – most of them are not rich and powerful they are just willing dupes being used by the real masterminds of the scam. The politicians and wall street scum are the ones pulling the strings and using the scam for maximum political power and obscene wealth redistribution. Try a Google search on “the great american bubble machine” and read the rolling stone article. Then Google “the green agenda” and read the quotes from the political leaders of the scam and the details of the UN Agenda21. Finally, Google “numberwatch warmlist” and read the ridiculous collection of warmist activist pseudo-scientists prostituting themselves for a share of the global warming scam grant money.

Your conclusion is illogical and reeks of ignorance but is exacly what we have come to expect from activists trying to use this scam to effect the social/political change THEY have decided the world needs.

…and if you really want to educate yourself and understand why the global warming scam has become such a liberal vs conservative issue; Google “20th century democide” and educate yourself about the history of how freedom and individual rights keep people alive while the consolidation of government power and limitations on individual rights kills people. The consolidation of global wealth and power via the global warming scam by the horribly inept and corrupt unelected and unaccountable UN bureaucrats would be a disaster for humanity and bring about the suffering and deaths of millions of innocent people.

Your conspiracy theory is unconvincing because it lacks evidence and logic. To convince reasonable people, you need to create a clear narrative based on facts that are tied together with logical connections. You’ve failed in this endeavor.

At the moment, the only consistency in your conspiracy theory is your willingness to ignore the many contradictions underlying it. For example you identify “wall street scum” as driving agents in your conspiracy theory, but your claim overlooks the fact that the Wall Street Journal has been overtly friendly to global warming skeptics in its editorial pages. You also identify politicians as agents in pushing a “green agenda,” but the voting record of the U.S. Congress proves otherwise.

I can see that you’re emotional about this subject, but irrationality sinks your conspiracy theory. You will probably have better luck selling your narrative at a convention of birthers since they’ve already proven that their conspiracy theories don’t require facts.

I see the denier drones are out. Nothing but rhetoric and conspiracy theories. Thanks for so wonderfully demonstrating that you are nothing more than an ideologue who is completely uninterested in science or facts.

In any event, the warming at the surface is real and caused by human emissions of greenhouse gases. Since humans live on the surface of the Earth, the temperatures there are something we need to be concerned about.